William Hankeford

Sir William Hankford ( 1350 – 1423), also written Hankeford, of Annery in Devon, was an English lawyer who acted as Chief Justice of the King's Bench from 1413 until 1423.

Origins Born about 1350, he came from a minor gentry family who took their name from their estate of Hankford, near Bulkworthy in the Devon parish of Buckland Brewer. The names of his parents are unknown, and he had a younger brother named John who died before him.

In 1398 he was one of the judges asked by Richard II to pronounce on the validity of the opinions given in 1387 by the judges who decided that the actions of the Lords Appellant were unlawful and treasonable. He declared that the responses were sound and loyal and that he would have given the same answers himself. Shortly after, he was appointed to succeed his friend Sir John Wadham as Justice of the Court of Common Pleas.

When King Henry IV replaced Richard II in 1399, he reappointed Hankford to the bench and at his coronation made him a Knight of the Bath. In the following years he was active as a judge and royal commissioner, at times also attending Parliament and the Privy Council. On the accession of King Henry V in 1413, he replaced Sir William Gascoigne as Chief Justice of the King's Bench, an appointment that was renewed under King Henry VI in 1422. Sir Richard Hankford (died 1431), who became his grandfather's heir in 1423. Jane Hankford (died 1448), who married, as his second wife, Sir Robert Cary (died about 1431). Having no children from this marriage, in 1433 she then married Sir Theobald Gorges (died 1470) and had three children with him.